


Hanging By a Thread

by StarsCrackedOpen (Misthia)



Series: Things Carried, Unseen [17]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Ahsoka Tano Needs a Hug, Anakin Skywalker Needs a Hug, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Best Friends, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), Heavy Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Master & Padawan Relationship(s), Post-Betrayal, Pre-Relationship, Protective Ahsoka Tano, References to the Jedi Council (Star Wars), The Force, Undercover Missions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-15
Updated: 2020-08-15
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:01:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25917751
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Misthia/pseuds/StarsCrackedOpen
Summary: “They lied to me, Ahsoka.” His voice cracked. “Obi-Wanlied to me.”“I know,” she said, voice small, her heart breaking. “I’m sorry.”Or: In which Anakin reels from the council’s — and worse, Obi-Wan’s — deception, and Ahsoka won’t let him fall.
Relationships: Anakin Skywalker & Ahsoka Tano, Anakin Skywalker/Ahsoka Tano, Obi-Wan Kenobi & Ahsoka Tano, Obi-Wan Kenobi & Anakin Skywalker
Series: Things Carried, Unseen [17]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1839160
Comments: 16
Kudos: 227





	Hanging By a Thread

**Author's Note:**

> I have another for you. This takes place immediately following the faked death of Obi-Wan and him being undercover as the man who “killed” him. We know Anakin was enraged, and we know that at the end Palpatine was trying to turn him right there and he resisted. So I don’t think we saw the fallout of all of that.
> 
> As usual, you can read it as deep platonic or pre-relationship, whichever you wish.

* * *

_“Howling ghosts, they reappear_

_In mountains that are stacked with fear_

_But you’re a king, and I’m a lionheart”_

_— “King and Lionheart,” Of Monsters and Men_

* * *

Ahsoka didn’t know what to do.

She hadn’t seen her master in almost three rotations, and he didn’t respond when she reached through their bond or the comm. He hadn’t shown up to their usual training times, no one had seen him at any meals, and then he missed a mission briefing.

No one there commented on it, and she was ready to scream _why are you acting like nothing is wrong_ — but she held her tongue until the end of the briefing, and then asked Master Kenobi for a word. He nodded, and followed her around the corner, where she rounded on him only to see the worry in his eyes too. It caught her short, and she felt guilty for forgetting that this had caused him pain too.

She didn’t bother with small talk. “Master Kenobi, I haven’t seen Anakin in days — he’s missed trainings, and he hasn’t answered when I’ve tried to reach him. Have you talked to him? _Seen_ him?”

Obi-Wan rubbed the stubble that was starting to grow back in. “I haven’t. I am worried about him too, but I fear if I tried to see him, he would...not react well.” He sighed. “I tried to explain to him, it wasn’t meant to hurt him. We did it to keep the situation secure. It was simply a mission, and it needed to be done.” His matter-of-fact tone twinged at something in her she’d thought she’d let go.

“ _You died in my arms_ ,” she said, feeling her own pain again and remembering how Anakin’s had washed over her, how fractured he’d felt to her in the wake of it. Anakin had pulled himself together in his grief and poured it into a single goal: Find Rako Hardeen. Now, knowing the truth of things, the way it had been handled by the council seemed almost cruel. “If you and he couldn’t have told me, fine. But you — you could have told _him_.”

“Ahsoka,” started Obi-Wan, and there was something a little harder in his face now. “Jedi _cannot_ allow attachments. You — and Anakin, _must_ remember that. I know...” He sighed again. “I know Anakin struggles greatly with it. But it is a _necessity_ , and he needs to understand.”

Obi-Wan paused and looked at her, not unkindly. “It gets easier with age, and you are both still young. But perhaps you should go see him. I daresay he’ll be more willing to talk to you than me.”

And so Ahsoka was making her way to Anakin’s quarters, not sure what to say, not sure what to do, knowing only that he needed help in some capacity and would not ask for it. She carried a plate of his favorite dish from their usual diner, suspecting he hadn’t eaten in some time.

Normally, if he were in a Bad Mood, she would have charged in, tried to drag him from his funk. But this, this was different, this was something deeper and darker and she couldn’t shake the instinct in her hindbrain that whispered _danger_.

As she neared his quarters, she could sense that something was very, _very_ wrong. She pressed the door chime, and waited. And waited.

Nothing. But she could sense he was in there, and she could sense he was in crisis. She thought about forcing the door with the override code — they both had the other’s, just in case — but immediately knew that would be the worst thing to do. He already had had his trust broken by his old master, he didn’t need it from his padawan as well.

Ahsoka pressed the chime again, and let her shields down so he could sense her worry for him, and the softness with which she approached. It reminded her of approaching a wounded animal and she immediately shook her head to banish the thought. He was her master and her best friend, and he would make it through this like they did everything in this war.

 _Go AWAY._ The impression hit her with the force of a punch, and she caught her breath and steadied herself. She’d expected this. Ahsoka exhaled.

_Master._

Again a push back, a rejection, and she tried not to take it personally. She brushed as lightly as she could at the bond. She wasn’t there as a Jedi, or as his padawan. She was there as his friend.

_Anakin?_

Now it was back to nothing. She was trying to decide if maybe she should use the override after all, because the worry in her was becoming more urgent, when the door _whooshed_ open and she had to bite back a gasp.

Anakin stood there, but everything was _wrong_. His eyes were red-rimmed and dark-circled, his hair unkempt. His tunic hung untied and he looked as though he hadn’t slept in days. The Force swirled around him turbulently, anger bleeding through. Ahsoka had never seen him in such a state, and it frightened her a little. She buried that where he couldn’t sense it, and met his eyes.

Anakin _glared_ at her, clearly trying to intimidate and push her away, but she just looked back at him, throat tight, unwilling to leave him to himself. After a long moment he seemed to realize she wasn’t leaving, but also wasn’t looking for a fight — and maybe he was just tired of being alone. He stepped back and turned away into the darkened apartment, and as Ahsoka entered her eyes widened.

His quarters were destroyed. One chair was overturned, and another had been smashed, clearly against the table, which was dented but still intact. A wall hanging had been ripped down, his tinkering table cleared onto the floor, and through the tiny kitchen’s doorway she saw open cabinets and the shine of broken dishware. Clothing was strewn about.

She wondered how much he’d done purposefully and how much had been unintentionally reactive, in the way that Force-sensitive younglings would sometimes throw or break things with the strength of their emotions. To control it was one of the first lessons an initiate learned. But then Anakin had joined later than most, and _felt_ more intensely than just about anyone.

Ahsoka set the food she’d brought onto the dented table, trying to intuit what to do next.

She turned to where Anakin sat on the small couch, leaning on his knees with the heels of his hands pressed to his eyes. Surrounded by the ruin of his living space, sitting in the dark, he suddenly seemed very isolated. An island in the sea of his own destruction.

Her brilliant master, burning himself out in his rage, like a dying star.

The thought tore at her heart and made the lump in her throat excruciating, and she swallowed it as best she could.

She sat next to him on the small couch, tucking her leg so she could face him. She waited. She didn’t know what she was waiting for, exactly, only that he had to initiate this.

After a long time — or maybe not, it was hard to tell, in the swirl of the Force and the dim light — Anakin took a deep breath. The words came out in spurts, as if he had to expel them but it was hard to speak.

“The council... _lied_ to me. They made me believe Obi-Wan was _dead_ , they _made me watch him die_ — and I went out to — to _kill_ Hardeen and I — _I almost did_ , and it was _Obi-Wan_ the _whole time_. I— _I almost killed Obi-Wan_ and they didn’t tell me, why didn’t _he_ tell me, why didn’t they _trust_ me, _why doesn’t my master trust me_ —”

His shoulders shuddered, and her heart ached, and she kept listening as the words spilled forth.

“They wanted my — my reaction to be _genuine_ , like I’m a _puppet_.” He nearly spat the last word. “I fight their _war_ , I follow their ways and their orders, and if — if they lied about _that_ , what _else_ are they lying about?” He shook his head and tangled his fingers in his hair.

“I _wouldn’t_ — I could _never_ — do that to him, _lie about that_ , or to _you_ , and _you_ , you wouldn’t —”

Anakin looked at her suddenly, eyes hard, and Ahsoka knew all at once his desperation to _trust_ and be _trusted_ , and she knew too that she never would do what they had done, not to him. She looked him in the eye and let him feel her honesty as she shook her head. “ _Never_ ,” she whispered.

“They lied to me, Ahsoka.” His voice cracked. “ _Obi-Wan_ lied to me.”

“I know,” she said, voice small, her heart breaking. “I’m sorry.”

His jaw was clenched so tightly it must’ve been painful, and as she sat there with him his eyes welled and spilled over, clearly against his will.

Not knowing what else to do, she reached out and drew him into an embrace, and he turned his face into her neck. He made no sound, but his shoulders shook in her arms and her dress soaked through. She cradled the back of his head, desperate to help and knowing she could do nothing to fix this. He clung to her like a lifeline. She gently tipped them back to lean against the arm of the couch, as it poured out of him.

She held him, feeling the depth of the betrayal, the rage, the _grief_ he’d spent thinking Obi-Wan had been killed, all spill over into his presence and through their bond. The darkness that too frequently hovered around his edges bled through it all, an oil slick in ribbons of fear and anger.

She stroked his hair and kept a hand on his back, as if she could wrap herself, her presence, around him and protect him from his own onslaught. It was as though his body could no longer contain all the emotion he had swallowed and masked and struggled to bury, and now it was pouring out in a tsunami as his shields failed and his exhaustion took over. “I’ve got you,” she murmured once, hoping he would hear the words and everything beneath them.

She didn’t say anything more, and neither did he. She pressed nothing through the bond, just kept it open as he washed over her. If he reached through to her would find only caring and trust, her fondness and affection for him. She didn’t pity her master, though she hurt for him, and for herself, and for this war that seemed endless.

Eventually, after a long time, his breathing evened out. The bond quieted a bit, the darkness edged back from him. It felt like a fever breaking, though not a physical one. “Anakin?” She said, very quietly. There was no answer.

He was asleep, out cold. Ahsoka held him for a few more minutes, unsure if it was for him or for herself. She gently, slowly edged out from under him, sliding a cushion under his head, lifting his legs onto the couch, and covering him with a blanket. He didn’t stir through any of it, and so she quietly moved about, picking up the overturned furniture, sweeping up the broken cups and chair and putting his quarters back together.

When she was done, the space no longer looked like his rage, and she hoped that it would make it easier for him to process when he woke up. She turned to him once more. Ahsoka sent the lightest touch of affection through the bond, a promise she couldn’t put into words, and then left his quarters silently.

* * *

The next morning she showed up at their usual training ring, unsure what to expect. Her master was there, put together as usual, the picture of normalcy. “’Morning, Snips.”

She blinked, but followed his lead. “Hey master.”

Anakin proceeded as normal through the morning, and it felt good to spar, to burn off the tightness that she hadn’t even realized was coiled inside her. She smiled for what felt like the first time in years.

When they finally broke near midday, he paused. His voice was rough.

“Ahsoka.”

She turned, and he looked as though he wanted to say something, lips parting, but no words came out. His eyes were clear but held volumes. After a long moment, his lips pressed together again, and her expression was tender as she nodded.

His voice steadied. “C’mon, let’s go get lunch.”

They never spoke of it again.

_**Fin.** _

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed! As ever, please let me know your thoughts.  
> I know there’s an argument to be made that Anakin might seem too emotional in this, but he is at his core an emotional person. And he’s not showing it publicly, either — he’s in his quarters with the person I would argue understands him best.


End file.
